The National Night Stick | McGinty Survives!

No. 117

Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.

May 23, 2013

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The popularity of the Cardiff Giant, an allegedly petrified giant man found buried in New York, was so great that spectators continued to pay to view him even after he proved to be a hoax. This prompted showmen throughout America to exhibit their own petrified men. Among the greatest was McGinty, exhibited by the notorious western conman, Soapy Smith, in Creede, Colorado, in 1892. Incredibly, 119 years later, McGinty is still on display at Ye Olde Curiosity Shoppe in Seattle, Washington, where he is known as Sylvester. Read McGinty’s story at Soapy Smith’s Soap Box.

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Comments (2) -

11/1/2011 11:35:04 AM #

Thank you for the link! The fact that McGinty the petrified man still exists has always fascinated me. I think I mistakenly misled you to believe it is still in Colorado. Actually McGinty is now exciting visitors at the Ye Olde Curiosity Shoppe in Seattle, Washington. There he is known as Sylvester. I have a carte de vista photograph taken between 1892 - 1895 of McGinty alongside a photo of Sylvester in my book, Alias Soapy Smith: The Life and Death of a Scoundrel. It is rather obvious that they are one and the same.

In the 1970s while traveling my brother sent us a photo of Sylvester. At another period in time my uncle Joe sent us a photo of McGinty that Soapy had in his saved artifacts. It was not until the 1990s in a dream that I put the two photos side-by-side and realized they were of the same corpse.

Jeff Smith

Jeff Smith | Reply